We saw “The Case of Benjamin Button” yesterday.  The story was told sort of Titanic style with the elderly, dying main character telling the story in a past reflective way.  The story was well told and the special effects were very, very good.  The aging and de-aging were unbelievably good.  The movie is a bit lengthy, however it’s not overdone,  there’s never a lag in the story, and the ending did not disappoint either.   This movie is worth seeing in the theater.

This is funny.  Would be interesting to observe it in person.

 http://www.maniacworld.com/frozen-in-grand-central-station.html

I think I will definitely add this to my list of places to visit if I make it over to Japan to visit my American friend residing there.  Maybe he should check this out first hand and report about it in his blog…<<hint, hint>>.  Apparently there is a wine spa where you bathe in wine in a pool of sorts.  There is also one where you can bathe in beer.  I guess you really can pick your poison, huh?

http://abcnews.go.com/Travel/popup?id=3515313

http://photos.igougo.com/pictures-photos-r1176760-p178160-wine_spa.html

 http://japansugoi.com/wordpress/japanese-beer-spa-at-hakone-kowakien-yunessun/

We rented this movie when we went babysitting the other night.  It is a creepy, thought-provoking thriller, and very good.  See it if you get a chance!

Tonight is girls’ nite with Squid and me.  We had big plans, order in pizza, watch a movie, go  book shopping.  The pizza came, we had a fire going in the fireplace, ate while watching Run’s House, then What Not To Wear.  Then Squid decided to lay near the fireplace and promptly fell asleep.  It is now 9:45 and she’s been snoozin’ away for close to an hour.

Woohoo!  That about sums up our wild & crazy girls’ nite.   

On Saturday the Halloween celebrations commenced…

Well I couldn’t find the link for this year’s production of Dracula at Meydenbauer.  Anyway, my best friend Kim brought her 5 year old son for his first ever ballet production.  He was in costume and really excited for Dracula.  Apparently he wasn’t aware what ‘ballet’ really meant, so after about the 3rd scene that were a bit on the ‘Sound of Music’ side, he loudly asked when the dancing was going to be over.  When they got to the scary parts, he really enjoyed it. 

So after an early dinner, Keven, Alyssa & I were on the road to Buckley to do the haunted corn maze. <<link attached>>  Now THAT was fun!  It’s been a long time since I’ve been to a good haunted house, so over the past few years I’ve been a bit on the Scroogey side about going.  I’ve done the corn maze in Marysville and have thought how creepy it would be to do it at night. So this year I was looking around online for a nighttime corn maze.  I found it about the same time I started hearing ads for it on the radio.

The website recommended buying a fast pass online ahead of time and without guarantee of getting in as the last 2 weekends prior to Halloween are unbelievably busy.  We were totally winging it,  and prepared that we may get down there and have to turn around and come home.  When we arrived at 7:40, there were a lot of people, but not a horrendous amount.  The ticket line indicated that tickets were being sold for the 10:00 tour. So Keven went to check on the fast passes and we were able to get in at the head of the line for fast passers at 8:00!  While we were waiting there were a couple of kids performing, one of which I think may have tried out for American Idol.   One of the kids was this 11 year old boy who could dance hip-hop like you wouldn’t believe.  It was addictive watching him go.

8:00 rolled around and it was our turn to go.  I was really hoping it wasn’t going to be really corny or dumb, but they did a damn good job.  It’s long too, taking 20-30 minutes to make your way through and there is quite a variety of things to tingle your senses…strange noises, chain saws, ghosts, and all kinds of questionable characters walking through the path with you or coming out of the corn…sometimes jumping out at you. There are spots that are totally quiet which heighten your senses as you wait for the next unexpected thing.  There are also other things like the indoor maze that is completely pitch black and you feel your way through it…at points things like feathers brush against your face, others squirted with cold, I’m going to assume, water.  There are other mazes, rooms, etc. with strobe lights which created another very odd effect, especially when you’ve just been in the dark.  At the end of the tour there is a maze created in chainlink and with another strobe light.

When you’re done with that one, there is another corn maze you can do un-toured and you take your own flashlights.  There are separate maps of routes you can take. It is completely pitch black in there and the corn is much more dense than the one we did.  We didn’t have a chance to get to it since it closed earlier than we realized.

Overall it was a lot of fun and better than most haunted houses I’ve been to.  I highly recommend it.  It is a bit on the pricey side, about the cost of a ticket to the Puyallup Fair, but definitely well worth it.  If you get a chance to go, do it…at least once.

http://marisfarms.com/

Death at a Funeral (2007) – Movie Details – Yahoo! Movies

If you liked Four Weddings and a Funeral  and British humor, you will like this movie. It’s a kooky comedy of errors that take place prior to, and at, an in home funeral.  The only thing really missing was Hugh Grant.  Somehow he would’ve fit perfectly in this movie.

I think for me, some of it dragged on a bit. Overall though, not a bad movie.  It was quite entertaining and funnier reliving the highlights more so than during the movie.  Oddly enough.  But then again, I have the same reaction to South Park, so take that with a grain of salt.

Last night it was monsooning like you wouldn’t believe.  It had been warm and unbelievably muggy all day.  Everyone was complaining about how miserable it was.  Ugh.

We tried to see Transformers in the theatre, but the lines were incredibly long, presumably mostly for Harry Potter, but Transformers was sold out.  So we grabbed a bite to eat and then headed home to finish For Your Consideration. 

At one point it was raining really hard and we heard something outside the front door.  Keven got up and opened the door and a little frog hopped right past him and under the couch.  He got a glass jar and secured him so we could take pictures before setting him free. 

It took us 2 nights to watch it, however we finished For Your Consideration last night.  It’s a pretty good spoof of Hollywood.  Everyone is so egomaniacal and shallow. 

While filming a low-budget indie film, the proverbial cat is let out of the bag about possible Oscar nominations for 3 of the 4 charactors.  Initially the movie is about a dying older mother and her adult children returning home for the Jewish holiday, Purim.  As the filming progresses, the actors/actresses become more obsessed with their potential nominations, the “suits” decide that the holiday should be changed to be more pc, agents start blowing their own horns about how good they are, etc.  The title eventually was changed to “Home for Thanksgiving” rather than “Home for Purim”. 

Ultimately an unlikely was nominated (no, I didn’t leave a word out) and it’s ironic to see how the others were humbled when they had to return to their previous lives.

It was entertaining and there were some really funny moments that had us cracking up. We spent quite a bit of the movie trying to place the faces/voices.  Overall it was a good movie, not great, however I still think it was good enough to rent. 

If you like psychological thrillers, go see Mr. Brooks.  The critics bashed it pretty hard, but the viewer’s reviews on both Yahoo and Rotten Tomatoes gave it pretty good reviews. 

Keven Costner has been nothing short of a disappointment for the past 10 years or so, but used to be a decent enough actor.  I liked him in Field of Dreams, and some other movies I’m not going to list, and while I’m not a huge fan, I’m not a hater either.  His performance was pretty good in this movie.  The storyline was good and original, not one I’ve seen or read before, and there were a couple of interesting twists.

See a matinee or rent it if you’d like, but it is definitely worth seeing.  2 thumbs up for me!